13th september 2008 - happy 50th birthday robert millar

Robert Millar was born to William and Mary Millar in the family home, 4 Wellcroft Place, in the Gorbals area of Glasgow, at 6.15am on 13 September, 1958. Mary and Bill - as he was known - already had a son, Ian, born on 29 December, 1955. A daughter, Elizabeth, would follow on 29 January, 1962. At the time of Robert's birth his father's occupation was listed as an ironmongers' assistant. The couple had married on 30 March, 1955.

The Millars lived in tenement housing in the Gorbals, large parts of which were, by then, in a state of serious decay. The Millars' home was typical of the area: a four-storey sandstone tenement, with one large living room, including a kitchen, a bedroom and a toilet, but no bath.

for the cyclist with everything else

as i may have mentioned on one or two (maybe even one too many) times before, thewashingmachinepost confers a great deal of benefits on its incumbent staff: me. currently sitting in thewashingmachinepost bike shed is a colnago eps, the very same machine as ridden by erik zabel in the tour de france, and currently in the vuelta espana. it is, the very latest, top of the range machine from cambiago, and i have no qualms whatsoever in letting you know that it's like christmas about four months early. ok, so i have to send it back when the review is completed, but you can bet your bottom dollar that i'm going to enjoy every minute of our time together.

but as i've said before, i'm a very lucky guy. but i'm sure we all know cyclists who seem to have the very latest and best of everything, and they don't have to send it back to the shop when they've finished with it. and if they happen to be someone close either by way of family or friends, there's bound to come a time when you have to think about what the heck to get them for birthday or christmas. a puncture repair kit , doesn't quite cut it. so how about buying them a cycle team?

well, actually, just a bit of a cycle team. it's a sponsorship model that has been seen before, and one that has had a degree of success. sell the fans a share in the team, make sure they're kept up to date with the results, a complete set of team kit, a chance to avail themselves of a team bike, and the odd weekend when cycling with the chaps is just a matter of course.

rapha condor recycling are giving you the opportunity to do exactly that. for less than half the cost of the colnago eps frame and forks, you and 99 others can own a share of the team. i tell you this now, because the offer of membership is open only until the end of this month, and the necessary proof of ownership can simply be kept in an envelope at the back of the drawer until mide december, with a do not open until christmas day written in pen. click across to the appropriate page of rapha's website where you can download the membership pdf, as well as read the list of benefits of ownership.

should you be the ceo of a large corporation that would like to buy itself a birthday or christmas present, you may have to dig a smidgeon deeper into that piggy bank (£10,000), but as jennifer aniston used to say in those l'oreal adverts...

'you're worth it'

the colnago eps review/road test will appear in the fullness of time - once the grin calms down a bit

the tour of britain

yet again, for the second year in succession, my footerings on islay have prevented me trundling across to scotland to watch the single, north of the border stage of the tour of britain. but for the first time since the race surfaced to entertain british cycle fans, one of the major television networks has seized the post beijing opportunity to televise the entire affair via one hour highlights each evening on itv4. commentators are hugh porter and anthony mccrossan.

and the one thing that seems different about this year's event, is that it seems like a proper bike race; i don't mean to sound harsh, nor to be critical of previous years, and maybe it says more about me than the cycling, but i always had the impression that other than the brits, other riders were there because they had to be. but this year is visibly different.

there are decent sized crowds at the side of the roads, even in the more obscure parts of the route, and it seemed, initially at any rate, the petacchi, de luca and other 'famous names' were really there to give a good showing. heck, alessandro even won the first stage. but with some excellent camera work, and a real, live helicopter to give us those aerial shots of not only the peloton, but a wide variety of the more scenic parts of britain. sadly my meanderings will probably mean i miss the scottish bits, but i'll ask anthiony when i next see him.

so maybe britain is finally getting it. with a bucketload of medals back from china, a tremendous prologue to the tour en londres in 2007, mark cavendish winning whichever stage of whichever race that takes his fancy, maybe britain as a whole, has finally seen the light. the next check-in point will be the attendance figures at october cycle show at earls court.

i shall be checking just in case.

just in case you think i'm exaggerating, and no matter what you think of their roster of riders, rock racing have pushed the uk boat out on their website. take a look (love the graphics - just what cycling needs)

in my experience, there are only three types of book; those which treat their subject with aplomb, engaging the reader from page one and enlightening through careful deployment of the writers' craft; those which quite blatantly do not; and those which have all the qualities of the first category, but with such masterful use of the written word that the subject matter is all but transcended, and the author has achieved the level of the true artist.

tomorrow we ride... achieves the latter, one of the finest examples of literature, cycling or otherwise, it has been my pleasure to read (twice, so far). if you enjoy reading rouleur every few months, you will absolutely dote on this book. of course, the author, as well as being the younger brother of the first rider to win the tour de france three times in succession, was also an english scholar, having achieved a ba from the university of rennes. he was presented with one of the university's choicest foreign language assistant's posts at robert gordon's college, aberdeen in 1951 (unfortunately misplaced as aberdeen university in roger st pierre's foreword, same location, but different).

this does make it all the more unusual that this book is the result of an english translation by adam berry from the original french publication in 2004. it seems likely that, should he have felt the urge, jean bobet could have comfortably managed the translation himself. mr berry, however, should feel a warm glow every time a copy of this is sold, for he has made an exemplary job of translation.

the book is not a biography of louison bobet, as brother jean is at pains to point out;for me, pouring every detail of louison's life through a biography would be like violating a sanctuary. louison bobet is not a sanctuary, but he is a myth.

every biographer is to some extent a voyeur. a biographer inside the family would be nothing short of a vampire.

so what sort of book are we left with? obviously jean bobet's decrying of it as a biography may simply be one of semantics; the book details the finer and more personal facts of louison's career just as any direct biography would, but with the benefit of, as jean puts it my special insight. since the two were contemporaries, separated by only five years, louison's character traits and thoughts are keenly observed, converted to the written word with the skill of an intellectual. jean bobet seems slightly ill at ease with the latter description of himself, but his writing all but confirms it to be true.

after the 21 year-old jean, still pursuing his academic treatise on hemingway in aberdeen received a letter from louison (he drew me into his slipstream) he convinced himself that he was about to take a sabbatical of one or two years, before returning to his beloved studies. he would extricate himself from academia and pursue the same channel as his brother; as a racing cyclist.

jean bobet thence commenced his employment as a racing cyclist with the same team (stella) as brother louison in 1952. from here onwards we are treated to almost a double biography, or rather an autobiography as well as a biography, for jean's writings tell as much about himself as they do about his brother. the latter's rise to fame as one of france's finest cyclists of his generation is thus characterised by one who knew him well, who knew him intimately, describing all through specific races such as paris roubaix, the tour of flanders, the tour de france and the road world championships which louison won in 1954.

of course, his three tours de france, won in successive years from 1953 to 1955 put louison firmly in the pantheon of greats, and while jean appears to have pedalled in the shadow of his brother, he was no mean cyclist himself, winning paris-nice in 1955. but the great joy of this book is that, finally, the beautiful sport has been put into words by one who not only sees it as we do, but has the wherewithal to use language that befits its standing in the cyclists' psyche. his comprehension of what it is we find magnificent about our sport, in particular the nostalgia we have for the fifties, is summed up quite succinctly; he deals up front with his naivety on the subject of doping, and how it brought him to resign himself from the peloton at the age of twenty eight; blokes who were inferior to me were suddenly leaving me standing. it seems that little changes. he tried it himself (metedrine), to see what the effect would be, breaking a tablet in half - the other for louison. at the end of the race, in the showers, his brother produced his half of the tablet 'i didn't take your stuff'

when both had left the sport, they set up a business to promote the benefits of thalassotherapy, basically seawater health treatment, but after louison was diagnosed with an incurable tumour, his fortitude gradually, and not unnaturally, deteriorated.

the following sunday, he escaped.

a genuinely superb book, that will indulge all your passions for the sport, while satisfying even the most searching of literati. i really cannot recommend this book highly enough.

sportique massage oils

any documentary of cycling worth its salt will invariably show the riders having their post race massage, a customary rite that seemingly all professional, and even some amateurs undergo to finish off business for the day, and prepare them for the next day's training or racing. oh that we should have someone waiting just inside the back door waiting to do the same for us after the sunday morning ride. i'm generally luck if mrs washingmachinepost even looks up from the telly as i drip into the sitting room, dropping mitts and helmet as i pass. if i need a massage, it's using the b&q method (for those other than uk residents, b&q is a do it yourself chainstore).

however, there is no shame in this; if you haven't retained the services of an on-staff masseur, there is little alternative available other than massaging the legs sitting on the edge of the bath. this is the time when you find out just how necessary it is to have the legs shaved - kneeding a pair of knotted pins that resemble the undergrowth in sherwood forest is not the most rewarding of apres ride pastimes. and then, of course, something other than johnson's baby oil with which to reduce the inevitable friction would doubtless enhance the experience; and your credibility, should anyone inadvertantly enter while mid-massage.

i have, up until now, figured that the massage experience was something that, for me, would remain something watched on the aforementioned cycling documentaries. that was until i decided to commence kneeding with any of the three flavours of massage oil from active body care people at sportive. in its basic format, sportique offer 100 percent jojoba oil, along with the more aromatic and flavoursome variants - jojoba oil with apricot, evening primrose oil, yarrow and arnica extract, as well as the princely jojoba oil with evening primrose oil, olive oil and citrus extract.there seems little, if any, difference between the three in effectiveness of end result, and doubtless the principal result is a subjective notion itself, but i cannot but deny the incredible lightness of being that can be experienced from vigorously applying any of the above to one, other, or both tired legs. in a totally unscientific experiment, i massaged the right leg with the evening primrose, and the left with the apricot. fortunately for those in close proximity, the aftermath is not as pungent as it may at first seem, but both legs felt particularly relaxed and ready to take on mark cavendish next day.

the trained masseurs accompanying this year's london-paris ride were apparently using these very products, even available during lunch stops, which would doubtless explain why several riders were not only moving faster than i during the pm, but smiling broadly while doing so. according to sportique, dribbling a few drops in the bath can have a soothing effect on those tired, overworked muscles (and that's only taking the colnago out the bike shed).

all three flavours of sportique massage oil arrive in 150ml bottles, and retail at around £13 ($17.95). take your pick or nab one of each - the choice is yours.

stop it

in the early days of thewashingmachinepost, i was renowned, by a very small audience, for writing the equivalent of pages and pages on the most urbane of cycling subject matter. the gist of this was my modus operandi of the day, where i would arrive home on a friday eve, sit down in front of the mac, and write about anything that took my fancy at the time. not so very different from nowadays, now that you come to mention it, but i am, thankfully, considerably less long-winded than of yore, either due to lack of training, or just because i don't have the same stamina i had ten years ago; it's probably an age thing.

many of these early articles, some of which are bound to be still residing in the archive section of the post, concerned themselves with aspects of our modern steeds, often from a repair or maintenance point of view, and a modest degree of the latter over the weekend has placed one component in particular in a new perspective. over the years, and i plead guilty of this myself, i have seen many a bicycle which has received an upgraded chainset, rear mech, saddle, stem/bars etc. when there was, in fact, nothing particularly wrong with the outgoing component. many of these alterations were purely on a whim, or because the latest version looked more whizz bang than its predecessor.

however, the one component that seems to avoid this festival of upgrades is the humble caliper brake, quite possibly because, assuming you maintain an eagle eye on the pad wear and attached cables, brakes don't change their skins too often. there are, of course, a favourable number of boutique calipers available on the market nowadays, fashioned in carbon, titanium ar sometimes just plain old chunky cnc aluminium. sadly, reviews of some have indicated more show than go (or stop, to be perfectly correct), not always commensurate with the substantial hike in price over the standard offerings.

but taking the humble caliper brake in isolation, it's a component that has seen some substantial development over the decades, moving from the rod operated brakes that pulled vertically and acted upon the flat of the rim, rather than the side to the shiny metal that keeps us from getting into more trouble than we can handle day to day. the offerings from campagnolo, sram, fsa and shimano achieve stopping power that almost defies the laws of physics; that the professionals can slow from around 100kph to single figures for a hairpin bend on many an alpine descent, is something we may never have to attempt, but somewhat comforting that it can be achieved.

perhaps the most prominent development in recent years has been the move from single pivot to the so-called dual pivot design, allowing each caliper arm to exert force on the wheel rim independently (so to speak) of its partner. many of campagnolo's groupset offer a single pivot on the rear, since their engineers feel that with all the bicycle and rider's momentum moving to the front wheel in severe braking, there is no requirement for the dual pivot power on the trailing rear wheel. personally, i have no idea if this is noticeable in day to day riding or not, but i'm happy to take their word for it.

users of each manufacturers offerings will no doubt have gripes about others; my road tests of shimano equipped bikes have highlighted differencesbetween theirs and vicenza's, but it's far more likely that this is due to pilot error - when you've used one type from inception, it's often hard to make instaneous adjustment to another that may have a different modulation or force. of course, it's hard for the engineers of any of the top profferers of brakes, to make incremental improvements substantially visible. hence last year's caliper looks much the same as this year's, despite the brochure claiming a percentage increase in power.

so now that eurobike has passed, interbike has yet to arrive, and earls court around a month away, when you're drooling over the latest offerings from whichever is your favoured choice, don't gloss over the brakesets. they are the very components that allow you to enjoy the rest of the groupset to excess.

bicycle film festival, london

as a self confessed grumpy old fart, it is quite some time since i attended anything remotely resembling a pop or rock concert. many of the bands of which i used to buy every release, are a good bit older than i, definitely not considered to be the latest and greatest, and generally charging a not inconsiderable sum for tickets. and being a good little cyclist who saves every penny for cycle related purchases only, such tickets are under a self-imposed off-limits ban. but the fact that i have spent the last month or so listening to art blakey on the ipod, may give you some indication of where it's at this particular point in time. (and anyone who has to ask who art blakey is will be getting a visit from the boys later this evening).

however, in my days of youth, several of us used to attend gigs at the apollo (formerly green's playhouse) in renfield street, glasgow - not always managing to catch the encore, because we had to hammer it back down the road to central station to get the last train home at 11pm. one of the finest points of attending any gig by a major act, or perhaps even a minor one - aside from the music - was the opportunity to buy a t-shirt that proved you'd been there. ok, you could probably write to the band's agency and order one after the fact, but generally it was a fine way of going to school or work the following day and trying hard not to deliberatey attract attention to the t-shirt that you wanted everyone to notice anyway.

while it's still possible to wear something like a campagnolo, or park tool t-shirt in a similar way, when amongst our cycling peer group, we are generally dressed for cycling (now there's a surprise). so what could be worn to subtly advertise an affinity with a particular cycling event? jerseys, yes, but that might seriously impinge on the bank balance if this sort of thing happens too often, so what about a casquette? perren street cycle style gurus rapha, have been doing just this for at least a year; bike rides in the city, roller races and the like. come 5 october this year, the bicycle film festival visits london with support from a number of sponsors including rapha, who have issued a very stylishly different casquette for the occasion. a snip at only £15 with the bff logo flock printed one side and the rapha logo on the other. flip the peak up and there's a blue centre stripe sandwiched between the legend bff '08.

the festival, all of which takes place at the barbican cinema, starts on thursday 2 october and rolls through to saturday 4 october, but culminating in a bicycle polo competition and closing party on sunday 5 october. the still illustrated above is from the short film, les ninja du japon which precedes everybody's favourite: a rollapaluza roller race at carhartt warehouse in ellingfort road. also showing is the recently reviewed road to roubaix, the six-day bicycle races, urban bike shorts and several other 'must see' bicycle movies (if i'm completely honest here, i would tend to figure that any film about bicycles fits this category, but that's just showing my prejudice.) just have a look at the trailer for the way bobby sees it.

so, assuming you're anywhere near london on these dates, or there's the possibility you could pop down to the big city at the beginning of october, remember to buy the cap to prove that you've been there; if, like me, you can't make it, just pretend and buy the cap anyway - you can always watch the trailers on you-tube.